05.08.08
Posted in Cinema, Events, Silent Films, Cinema History, Sci-Fi and Horror Flix, Seattle Stuff, 16mm Film at 12:52 am by Spencer
Announcing a very special event co-presented by The Sprocket Society and the Northwest Film Forum
GEORGES MÉLIÈS: IMPOSSIBLE VOYAGER
Special effects epics from 1901-1912
Thursday, May 15, 2008 at 8:00 PM — One show only!
At the Northwest Film Forum — 1515 12th Avenue (on Capital Hill at Pike)
(206) 329-2629
$8.50 general admission / $5 NWFF members / $6 kids under 12 & seniors
Advance tickets available online via BrownPaperTickets.com
A special celebration of the mad filmic genius of Georges Méliès, the father of special effects, featuring rare 16mm film prints of his greatest sci-fi, fantasy and adventure epics…all presented with unusual musical accompaniment!
INCLUDING!
A rare presentation of The Impossible Voyage (1904) with a live performance of the original narration penned by Méliès himself plus music provided by Climax Golden Twins playing 78 rpm records on actual Victrolas, right there in the theater!
PLUS!
Six more great films, all presented with non-traditional musical recordings including free jazz by the Hal Russell NRG Ensemble, the Master Musicians of Jajouka, The Residents (in a special remix by Scott Colburn), demented Dada scat-jazz by Fred Lane, and more! Featuring…
- A Trip to the Moon (1901) — rare extended version!
- The Kingdom of the Fairies (1903) — rare “complete” version!
- The Palace of Arabian Nights (1905) — stunning acrobatic sets!
- Paris to Monte Carlo (1905) — with hand-colored scenes!
- The Merry Frolics of Satan (1906) — beautifully tinted!
- Conquest of the Pole (1912) — his last masterpiece in a (kinda) rare French version!
Learn more and see a bunch of photos, including rare behind-the-scenes shots and production drawings, at the Sprocket Society web site. You can also download the official press release (PDF, 112kb).
Hope to see you there… A splendid time is guaranteed for all!
(Poster design by Brian Alter.)
(This program is not affiliated with Flicker Alley, though I encourage you to check out their new Méliès DVD box set!)
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04.06.08
Posted in Cinema, Music, Events, Experimental Film, Seattle Stuff, 16mm Film at 6:43 pm by Spencer
This coming Sunday at the Rendezvous, the Sprocket Society presents a special event featuring original works by Los Angeles filmmaker and noted restorationist ROSS LIPMAN, plus live music by Seattle’s own RUBY THICKET and THE PHILISTINE LIBERATION ORCHESTRA.
Sunday, April 13, 2008 at 7:00 PM
The JewelBox Theater at the Rendezvous
2322 2nd Avenue, Seattle (in Belltown)
$5 suggested donation
More info at the Sprocket Society web site.
KEEP WARM, BURN BRITAIN! is Ross Lipman’s personal memoir of the London anarchist squatters movement during the 1980s. A work-in-progress, Ross will present it as a Magic Lantern slide show with live narration plus recorded music by legendary street performer Thoth (who was the subject of a 2002 Oscar-winning documentary short).
Lipman is internationally known for his film/video and performance work, as well his writings and restorations of independent cinema. His 16mm and 35mm experimental films have screened throughout the world at venues such as London International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives (NYC), the Los Angeles Film Forum, the San Francisco Cinematheque, Sixpackfilm/Top-Kino (Vienna), AMIA (Austin, Minneapolis), Chinese Taipei Film Archive (Taiwan), and many others. This is his Seattle debut.
Lipman is also one of the world’s leading figures in the restoration of independent cinema. Working at the UCLA Film and Television Archive, he has restored films by John Cassavetes, Kenneth Anger, John Sayles, Emile de Antonio, and others. In 2007, the National Society of Film Critics gave Lipman their Film Heritage Award “for the restoration of Charles Burnett’s Killer of Sheep and other independent films.”
Also on the program are several of Ross’ earlier experimental shorts and and documentaries:
10-17-88 (1989, 16mm)
An optically printed collage of found and archival footage, with audio collage by John (Ruby Thicket) Shaw.
AFTERNOON IN BOTTLE VILLAGE (2007, DV)
A requiem for Grandma Prisbrey’s famous cathedral of light, built entirely of glass bottles, pencils, and industrial detritus. With a score improvised on a broken piano by Jodie Baltazar (aka Monotrona).
THE GIFT: MICHAEL BARRISH SCREEN TEST (1997, Super-8)
A screen test for a film that was never made, a feature-length narrative about the unbridgeable gap and connection between a father and son.
PLUS!
Live music by RUBY THICKET
Featuring John Shaw (vocals, guitar, bass, harmonica), Mac McClure (bowed saw and vocals), Bob Barraza (drums, shakuhachi flute, ukulele, and vocals), Jillian Graham (vocals and rhythm guitar), and Jim Graham (bass). Download sample MP3s from their CD You Never Know What You’ll See.
And the sultry cacophony of THE PHILISTINE LIBERATION ORCHESTRA
Lounge and show standards crooned (or c-ruined?) over free improvised accompaniment. Featuring the velvet pipes of John Shaw backed by composer Bill Potter on guitar-synth, the lovely and talented David Milford on fiddle, members of Ruby Thicket, and other surprise guests. The set list includes songs associated with Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr., Kate Smith, Robert Goulet, Man of La Mancha, and Woody Guthrie.
Hope to see you there!
PS — Ross Lipman will be presenting at the Pop Conference at EMP this Friday, April 11. He will give his lecture “Mingus, Cassavetes, and the Politics of Improv”, using film clips, texts, and still photographs to examine the complex and explosive collaboration of John Cassavetes and Charles Mingus for the film Shadows (1959) at a pivotal moment in the history of independent cinema, jazz, and race relations. More info is online at the Pop Conference web site.
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02.17.08
Posted in Politics, Seattle Stuff at 5:28 pm by Spencer
Important info received from a friend…
Right now there are bills in the Washington state legislature (House Bill 3054 and Senate Bill 6638) that will extend arts funding to 4Culture from the King County lodging tax. If this bill doesn’t pass, arts funding in King County will become drastically reduced within a few years, and this will affect just about every arts organization in Seattle — theater, music, dance, film, spoken word, you name it.
Any resident of Washington state can help. Go to:
http://artsandheritage.weebly.com/
…and take just a few minutes to learn how to find out who your representatives are and how to send them a short e-mail or phone call, urging them to support this bill.
We have very little time to make this happen, and if it doesn’t happen this year, it’s going to be much harder to do in the future. Your e-mails and phone calls will have a significant impact.
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01.15.08
Posted in Music, Events, Friends and Family, Avant Experiwhosis, Seattle Stuff at 11:01 pm by Spencer
Not to dis any of the other performers (all of them outstanding and well worth your lousy half-a-sawbuck all on their lonesome), but I think they would agree it goes without saying that The act to catch is Alvarius B (aka Alan Bishop from Sun City Girls), who will be playing only his third solo show ever. If you haven’t heard his albums (or perhaps his collaborative releases with Cerberus Shoal and Dylan Nyoukis) you’re missing out. (Although: the SCG site offers the recent CD re-issue of his first album.) If you’re in town for this show Thursday night, you shouldn’t miss out even more. So what if it’s a school night? Everyone else at work will prolly have a hangover, too — only yours will be cooler.
There’s more about the line-up (including links to their various web sites) at The Rendezvous’ own web site.
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01.07.08
Posted in DVDs, Animation, Experimental Film, Seattle Stuff at 11:58 pm by Spencer
My old pal Hell’s Donut House just directed me to this excellent news from Brett Ingram, recently posted at Idiot Bastard Son, a Frank Zappa fan site:
In the next few months, Bright Eye Pictures will release Bruce Bickford’s Prometheus’ Garden, the first film over which Bickford maintained 100% artistic control.
Prometheus’ Garden is a 28-minute stop-motion film utilizing clay puppets and sets, cutouts, replacement series, aluminum foil, “strato-cut” slices, molten wax, and other techniques. The film is (very) loosely based on the Greek myth of Prometheus — an immortal who (in some versions of the story) created the first mortals out of clay. Bickford’s incorporation of this myth into his animated film includes appearances by Vikings, cowboys, Vietnam War era mercenaries, imps, elves, fairies, and countless other historical and mythological creatures.
Prometheus’ Garden, like most of Bickford’s later films, is an unscripted stream of consciousness animated over the course of years. Bickford began work on Prometheus immediately after the release of Frank Zappa’s film Baby Snakes in 1980. Prometheus’ Garden was completed by Bickford in 1988.
I recently recorded Bickford’s (characteristically dry-witted) commentary tracks for the upcoming DVD and began production on “extra” elements — including the documentary featurette, Luck Of A Foghorn. This new half hour documentary will take viewers behind the scenes and into the mind of Bickford. I shot miles of film while making Monster Road (the documentary feature I made about Bickford) and most of this footage has never seen the light of day. Luck Of A Foghorn will unearth these images along with footage from the making of Prometheus. Laird Dixon (from Shark Quest) has created an original score for Luck Of A Foghorn and it is hauntingly beautiful. The title of the featurette originates from a surreal day dream Bickford had while hovering near death with pneumonia in hospital.
I hope to have the DVD ready for sale on the Bright Eye Pictures site (along with Monster Road) no later than February 1, 2008. [See update, below.] Bickford has several films that have hovered near completion for years. Hopefully, the release of Prometheus’ Garden will spark a chain reaction so that Bickford’s recent work can find the audience it deserves.
As readers of Mugu Brainpan may recall, I’m huge fan of Bickford’s truly amazing animation (to wit and thus). It is my considered opinion that he is one of the greatest animators ever, as well as among the greats of visionary film more generally.
The reclusive filmmaker, who lives in the Seattle area, garnered some well-deserved attention thanks to the excellent aforementioned documentary, Monster Road (2005), after many years of grossly undeserved obscurity (not helped, I’m sad to say, by copyright snarls involving the Zappa estate). Following that release, Bruce surfaced in 2006 with an all-too-small spate of rare screenings and public appearances in Baltimore and Seattle, including a May 2006 screening at the Fantagraphics Bookstore and Gallery that included a recently completed new work of line animation.
The American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore included clay sculptures and projections by Bickford in Home & Beast, an exhibition that opened in October 2006 and ran for a year. His work was featured alongside paintings by William Kurelek in a gallery of the exhibit titled “Home Sweet Home,” described by the Museum as exploring “memories of home life and what, in fact, constitutes a home.”
Since precious few of Bickford’s astonishing film works are in circulation (and not even Canyon Cinema includes him in their legendary catalog of avant garde works), news of this DVD release is very good indeed. Keep an eye out, and kindly ask for it at your neighborhood video outlet.
Update: Brett Ingram recently announced on his blog that release of this DVD has been delayed (again), as he works to complete editing on Luck of a Foghorn: The Making of Prometheus’ Garden. Once completed, the whole shebang will still need to be mastered and duplicated, so it will be some weeks (at best) before the disc sees the light of day. Brett also announced he is launching a new web site, BrettIngram.org (still very much under construction, so don’t order yet), that will offer direct-sale copies of the Prometheus’ Garden DVD, as well as the collectors’ edition of Monster Road, his aforementioned (and excellent) documentary about Bruce Bickford. Watch this space for further info.
Bruce Bickford Films on Home Video
Baby Snakes (1979 - released on DVD in 2003) — A Frank Zappa concert film that includes several segments of Bickford’s animation. The most widely-seen examples of Bruce’s work.
The Amazing Mr. Bickford (1987, VHS - out of print) — A superlative anthology inexcusably unavailable on DVD. In Seattle, Scarecrow Video has a copy for rent (with deposit). Used copies also occasionally surface on eBay.
The Dub Room Special (1982 - released on DVD in 2005) — A sadly ill-fated TV special by Frank Zappa that, along with some great concert footage, includes various snippets of animation by Bickford.
Monster Road (2005 - released on DVD in 2006) — An excellent and endearing documentary that takes us into Bickford’s very private world. The DVD includes a number of his short films as extras, including spectacular examples of his line animation.
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10.07.07
Posted in Cinema, What I'm Reading, Silent Films, Cinema History, Seattle Stuff at 3:23 pm by Spencer
David Jeffers, SIFFBlog stalwart and inexhaustible silent film historian, used the recent series of screenings of Chaplin silents at The Paramount Theatre as hook to explore the rich but largely-ignored history of Seattle’s movie theaters and palaces. These postings of his on SIFFBlog are recommended reading, not least because he did some great legwork and unearthed rare photographs.
Here are links to the relevant articles:
While you’re there, also worth a read is David’s rare interview with Diana Serra Cary, better known as silent child star Baby Peggy, in which she reminisces about Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, and her childhood friend Jackie Coogan.
The Coliseum Theater in Seattle, circa 1936, at the corner of 5th and Pike. Today, it is the site of a Banana Republic store. Sigh.
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09.06.07
Posted in Whatever, Seattle Stuff, Reality is Weird at 9:23 pm by Spencer
A friend of mine arrived at home tonight in the University District, when someone flew close over their head and landed on a nearby fence.
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06.10.07
Posted in Whatever, Seattle Stuff at 7:04 pm by Spencer
Seattle + Copper River Salmon + Safeway Card Discount = elation
‘Course, if I had myself a grill and place to use it (curse of the endangered Seattle Apartment Dweller), that would equal out to “bliss”. And if I could also still find fuckin’ Thai-ger Sauce anywhere, that’d equal out to “sublime enlightenment”. But hey…since when was “elation” bad?
And hell: thanks to that Safeway card, I got $10/pound off! It may not be fresh off the boat, but I ain’t complainin’. (Hmmm…come to think: I ride by Fisherman’s Terminal every work day…)
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06.07.07
Posted in Cinema, Events, Seattle Stuff at 10:31 pm by Spencer
Riding home on the 44 bus recently, I espied on the marquee of the Metro Cinema in the U District a short message to the effect that something called Metro Classics is starting soon (colon), Sunrise.
“Sunrise?!” I exclaimed aloud while rubbing my eyes (ree-oo, ree-oo), startling both the proto-yuppie in front of me and the smelly wino behind me. (The Chicago expat in me does have a special appreciation of the 44 line.) Sunrise as in the 1929 silent-cum-added-sound masterpiece by no less than Murnau?? At the Metro?!?! Well, in fact…yes, that very one.
Indeed, the Metro Cinema — part of the Landmark chain that includes such wonderful local theaters as The Seven Gables, the Guild 45th and The Neptune — is making an experimental plunge back into the repertory film game. If it succeeds, there will be more…which I say is A Very Damn Good Thing.
This initial series runs weekly on Wednesdays from June 27 through August 22. In the press release, it’s being billed as “a decade-by-decade survey of film history from the 1920s through the 2000s,” and while some elitist wags (see comments @link) are sniffing at the choices, I think on the whole it’s a very good selection that balances the desire to represent with the goal of getting enough audience to convince Landmark to do more. (Okay. Personally, I don’t know that I would have picked the same film for the 2000s. But regardless, I applaud the thematic approach.)
I commend the series to you, and further suggest attending with regularity — not just because there’s some truly excellent flicks that truly deserve being seen on the Big Screen (e.g. The Seachers and Blow-Up in 35mm!), but also because I’d love to see more of this kind of programming.
Here’s the full schedule:
Wed. June 27 at 7 and 9 pm: Sunrise (F.W. Murnau, 1927, sync-sound version) - digitally projected
Wed. July 4 at 6, 8, 10 pm: Duck Soup (Marx Brothers, 1933) - digitally projected
Wed. July 11 at 7 and 9:15 pm: Casablanca (1942) - digitally projected
Wed. July 18 at 7 and 9:30 pm: The Searchers (Johns Ford & Wayne, 1956) - 35mm
Wed. July 25 at 7 and 9:30 pm: Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966) - 35mm
Wed. Aug 1 at 7 and 9:30 pm: Taxi Driver (Martin Scorsese, 1976) - 35mm
Wed. Aug 8 at 7 and 9:30 pm: Do the Right Thing (Spike Lee, 1989) - 35mm
Wed. Aug 15 at 7 and 9:30 pm: Miller’s Crossing (Coen Brothers, 1990) - 35mm
Wed. Aug 22 at 7 and 9:30 pm: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (Ang Lee, 2000/2003) - 35mm
This series is happening thanks to some enterprising souls who maintain the ironically-named blog, The End of Cinema. I’ve not fully plumbed the depths of the thing or sussed the Whos, but the main guy is someone named Sean, and this is what he had to say about it:
We’ve managed to convinced the powers that be at Landmark Theatres to allow us to program and run a repertory film series this summer at the Metro Cinemas in Seattle. It’s going to be a nine week series constituting a decade-by-decade survey of film history from the 1920s to the 2000s. If the series is successful (meaning if we can draw enough customers to break even) then they’re going to let us continue to program rep films in the future, and possibly expand the program to Landmark theatres in other cities around the country.
So standing ovation for “sean” and the undefined “we” for their initiative.
In fact, this is a bit of a return to roots for Landmark. I moved to Seattle in 1996, just in time to catch the last couple-few months of the Varsity Theater’s run as a repertory house. Frankly, that was one of several draws to the U-District for me. I love repertory houses. Sure, you can see a lot of the stuff on DVD or VHS ensconced on your couch, but there’s just no substitute for seeing films as they were meant and made to be seen: with an audience on the big screen.
Mucho kudos to Sean and the End of Cinema guys, and also to Landmark. More please!
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06.04.07
Posted in Whatever, Web Dev, Cinema, Music, Nifty Links, What I'm Reading, Politics, Seattle Stuff, Chicago at 11:19 pm by Spencer
What’s this fascist Dick hiding, anyway?
An above-average Sun Ra discography
The mighty Ivor Cutler on the John Peel show (thanks, Hell’s Donut House)
Weekly experimental music concerts at The Chapel in Wallingford (Seattle)
Dope-ass Vermont
Swanky “file browse” stylings (and another)
14 Rules for Fast Web Pages (excellent: summarizing Steve Souders’ presentation at Web 2.0, with links to the PowerPoint [very recommended] and all the references)
More optimization: “Performance Research, Part 4: Maximizing Parallel Downloads in the Carpool Lane” (YUIblog — related to the above)
More optimization: Optimizing Page Load Time (see bottom for additional links)
Why brain-teaser interview questions are stoopid
Bitchen 16mm scanned telecine machine (3 CCD coming soon, they say)
Official Forrest J. Ackerman site
The Online 78rpm Dicographical Project
The one and only Travis (ex-Ono)
Impressive synth sharity
And did I mention Vincent Collins?
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